CH 15.1

Chapter 15 (part 1)

Fu Zheng staying in her home for a second night didn't affect Ning Wan much. There was just one other person in the living room and one more mouth to feed. She slept soundly and was in high spirits the next day. Fu Zheng, however, might have been affected by the run-in with Gao Yuan from last night. He looked even worse in the morning, with skin paler than usual and enormous dark circles rimming his eyes. His was the face of a man who had lost confidence in himself due to the ravages of life.

Ning Wan dropped a few casual words of encouragement on him, then dragged him onto the early bus to Yuelan community's law office.

That morning, Ning Wan handed over all consulting calls to Fu Zheng, while she herself ran around the neighbourhood coordinating with the company that maintained the charging stations. Eventually, she finally solved the issue that Uncle Mao had talked about. Since the coin slots had already been set up it was impossible to add a new 50-cent coin slot, but a six-hour payment option had been added to the touch screen and it could be paid by card. The charging station company had also agreed to add a 50-cent coin slot to subsequent designs, wrapping up the matter.

She returned pleased to the community's law office to find the room overflowing with people and the door blocked. Even before entering, she could hear a loud racket from within and a voice roaring--

"How the hell is this possible! Lawyer, tell me, is such a thing actually legal?! How fucking shameless!"

Ning Wan pushed the door open and squeezed in to find five or six people in the office. The person who had been shouting just now was a tall, fat man in his forties. As his words petered off, the slightly younger man beside him who bore an obvious family resemblance echoed--

"Indeed! Isn't this fraud?!”

The women next to them began twittering shrilly, giving Ning Wan a headache. Just as she was about to raise her voice, Fu Zheng opened the desk drawer very naturally, took out Ning Wan's speaker, and hollered--

"Quiet down, everyone!"

“……”

Who could have expected Fu Zheng, who was here just because Gao Yuan had taken a fancy to him, to actually be quite a talented and quick learner?

Thanks to Fu Zheng's use of the speaker, the crowd in the office really did calm down. Ning Wan seized the opportunity to squeeze through and took her place next to Fu Zheng. "What's going on?"

Before he could answer, the middle-aged fat man who seemed to be the leader spoke, "Lawyers, it's like this. My name is Guo Jianguo." As he spoke, he introduced the man who resembled himself and the other three women. "This is my brother Guo Jianzhong, and my sister Guo Jianhong. The three of us are blood-related, with the same father and mother. The other two ladies are my wife and Jianzhong's. All of us are from the same family."

Ning Wan ran her eyes over the group of people. Guo Jianguo looked like a successful man in his suit and tie. Though his younger brother was not as fat, neither did he have a slender, scholarly look. Their eyes were shrewd, and merely by looking at their wives' bearings one could tell that they, too, would not be easy to handle. The wives didn't seem to get along too well, however. They stood far away from each other, as if drawing a line between them.

Between the women stood Guo Jianhong, who Guo Jianguo had introduced as his sister. Unlike her elder brothers, she was thin and tired-looking, her face much older than her sisters-in-law.

It was at this time that Fu Zheng handed a piece of paper over to Ning Wan. "Here are the facts that I just sorted out from their narratives." Although there were still dark circles under his eyes, she had to say that Fu Zheng was really getting the hang of working at the community quickly now that he had confessed to his real situation. Addressing her, he summed up the paper concisely, "This family is here to apply for legal aid, saying that their mother in her sixties has been defrauded by a 26-year-old boy."

"It being fraud makes this a criminal case. How much money was she defrauded of? Is it enough to file a case? This has to be reported to the police, it's outside our scope."

Fu Zheng licked his lips. "Apparently, it isn't a case of money. They say that this 26-year-old tricked her into marriage."

? ? ?

A 26-year-old tricked a 60-year-old lady into marriage?!

What a soap opera this was shaping up to be...

However, it had to be said. "When it comes to marriage, we cannot get involved. Freedom of marriage is a right. Even you, her children, cannot interfere with her choice of spouse, let alone us lawyers." Ning Wan looked at Guo Jianguo. "In this modern society, a May-December romance isn't unheard of. Merely relying upon the age of the young man is not enough to assume that he tricked her into marriage."

Guo Jianguo's hackles rose immediately upon hearing this. "Ma'am, you must be joking. What do you mean by a May-December romance? Can a thirty-year difference seriously be overlooked? What's more, even though our father has been dead for over ten years, my parents were quite close while he was alive. When he passed away, my mother was hit hard by grief to the point that her health deteriorated. With such depth of feeling, even if the other was an old man of the same age I doubt my mother would want to remarry. How would she possibly agree to marry a man young enough to be her son?"

Guo Jianzhong immediately backed his brother up. "That's quite right. You've never met my mom, and you don't know what she's like. She isn't the sort of old lady who decks herself out in heavy makeup and does square dancing. We're a country family and my mom is a typical old country lady. She's simple and honest, she doesn't know how to scheme like old women in the city do. She's never even had a makeover. If you ever saw her in person, you'd understand that she isn't the sort to want a second marriage."

The two wives came out to fight as well with teeth and tongue flashing like knives--

"Mother is such a simple woman, she would never go out to seduce a man! It's that bastard who must have sweet-talked her into it. He's her neighbour, who knows what he's been up to."

"That man is a foreigner1, divorced, with a four-year-old in tow, there's no way he's a decent person! A decent person would never have gotten a divorce. He's a con man just looking to get our mother's house! He thinks that if he gets married to her he can cheat her out of her money!" Guo Jianzhong's wife was the most candid out of all of them. Her words dripping with vitriol, she hissed, "Mom was just diagnosed with cancer a month ago. Who knows how long she'll live? Isn't this man just waiting for her to die so he can rob the house from us?!”

As Guo Jianguo, Guo Jianzhong and their spouses rushed to speak over each other, Guo Jianhong stood to one side, embarrassment and unease on her face. Her fingers twisted nervously in her skirts, and she made no comments.

Though it might be Fu Zheng's first time facing such a situation, Ning Wan had seen this happen many times before. If a child was divorced, nearly all parents hoped that  their offspring would find someone new to marry. But if it was a parent who was divorced or widowed, their children were often much more selfish. Most of them were against the remarriage of their parents. Not only would they oppose or obstruct the relationship, but they might even force their parents to give up on the new marriage by threatening to sever relations. The love of a parent for their child was generally selfless, but when it came to the feelings of a child about their parents, those were much more complicated.

Though the words spoken by Guo Jianzhong's wife grated on the ear, there was some truth to be gleaned there. Whether or not that 26-year-old boy had any ill intentions, the family opposed the old lady's second marriage, and it seemed as though there were some self-serving motivations behind it.

How many more days could there be for a woman in her sixties already diagnosed with cancer?

When she died, the house under her name should have been divided amongst her children, but if she had a legal husband and no will stating otherwise, that 26-year-old boy would be able to squeeze in for a piece of the pie.

Humans are often short-sighted, and in the face of tangible wealth, even familial love might fall short. Fu Zheng was witnessing this truth for the very first time. He said with a frown, "Marriage law emphasizes the right to freedom of marriage. Your mother is a widow, and the other party is divorced, therefore it is not bigamy; they are not close relatives, so there is no medical reason to prohibit the marriage. If you cannot prove that your mother has been coerced, it is free and legal for them to marry."

Ning Wan added in her two cents, "Even the elderly have the right to pursue their own love and happiness. Before your mother became your mother, she was first a woman. If you have no evidence to prove that the young man is malicious or that some form of deception is going on, but merely want to prevent your mother from remarrying because you don't want her to, then we can do nothing on your behalf. These are internal matters for your family to sort out between yourselves."

As soon as she stopped talking, Fu Zheng picked up where she had left off. "Of course, if what you are worried about is the potential future inheritance dispute due to this marriage, you can first ask your mother to make a will. We would be able to help you with that. To make a will, only two lawyers need to be present, and at least one of them must be a currently practicing lawyer. Lawyer Ning and I meet the conditions. If there is a need in this regard, we will be able to provide you legal services."

Despite their many previous misunderstandings and conflicts with each other, when the two of them received a case together for the first time, they cooperated very well. To Ning Wan's surprise, though Fu Zheng had no real practical experience, he was making rapid progress. It seemed as though he was a quick learner and very attuned to whatever the current situation was. 

As far as second marriages went, it was fairly common for the elderly to make concessions on their wills to placate their children and prove to them that their interests would not be affected by the second marriage, so that peace within the family might be maintained. Having the lawyers witness the will, as Fu Zheng had mentioned, was quite routine.

However, the Guo Jianguo/Guo Jianzhong couples were vehemently opposed to this course of action. "Sir, we know what the law says too. A will put down and witnessed now can still be changed later on, and then we'd all be bound to the second version."

"Yes, yes! Mother is ill now, her mind is disoriented and her body is weak. She's easy to persuade. Yet that swindler still wants to marry her. He's obviously got a wicked heart! With him next to her the whole time, and how easy to fool the elderly are, he'll definitely make off with all her money!"

……

There was a great ruckus made with a word from one and a sentence from the other, and in short, they all agreed on the following point: it was absolutely necessary to remove the risk at the root. The dying old lady in the family could not be permitted to marry that 26-year-old divorcee.

With no evidence of malice, however, even children had no right to interfere in their parents' marriage. Even having a lawyer was no use, but the family refused to give up.

Finally, Guo Jianzhong's wife had a brainwave. "Lawyers, our old mother is over 60 years old. Since she has lung cancer, she has undergone a lot of treatments and taken a lot of medication. It may also be because she hasn't been sleeping well, but in the past six months, she has been in very bad health. She can't take care of herself, and she needs people to help her walk. Sometimes she can't even tell the difference between day and night! She's obviously confused! That's the only explanation for how she could have been deceived like this. Lawyers, is this illegal? "

Ning Wan had been fully prepared to politely ask the family to leave, but when she heard this, she frowned. It's true that it was one thing for the old lady to marry if she was in full possession of all her faculties, but if she wasn't...

What she thought of, Fu Zheng immediately thought of too, and he quickly explained, "If your mother is indeed as confused as you are saying and cannot distinguish between day and night, then we no longer know what is her own decision and what isn't. If she is judged to no longer have the capacity to make her own decisions, then she cannot be married. A guardian will be appointed for her, who will act in her stead as a legal agent."

As if they had all just been saved from the jaws of a lion, the family's eyes lit up.